Your country needs ME, says CameronPosted by Ian at 9 18 PM on Saturday, February 27

DAVID Cameron will today declare it is his “patriotic duty” to win the general election... and urge voters to help him fulfil it.

The Tory leader will insist people are crying out for him to gain power to save the country from ruin.

He will tell his party faithful to go out and convince the doubters that Britain needs HIM.

Mr Cameron will say: “It’s an election we have a patriotic duty to win because the country is in a complete and utter mess.”

In a pre-election battle cry, he will tell the Conservative spring conference that five more years of Gordon Brown is not an option the nation can afford.

His final push for power comes as his lead over Labour in the polls has been slashed to a wafer-thin five points.

At the Brighton rally today he will also deliver a pledge to hard-working families that he will repay their support by putting them — and the country — first. And writing in the News of the World today, he tells readers: “If you do the right thing we’ll get behind you.”

Shadow Chancellor George Osborne last night gave a “cast iron guarantee” to the conference that a Tory government will not cut the NHS or pensions.

He also said that there would be no cuts to pension credits, winter fuel payments, free TV licenses and bus passes.

But Mr Osborne insisted Britain faces total economic collapse if Labour were to win the election — claiming there would be a “rush for the exits” by international investors.

DAVID CAMERON WRITES:

LAST week Gordon Brown asked us to take a second look at Labour. All right then... here goes.

They’ve doubled the national debt. Hit people with more than one hundred tax rises. Clobbered the poorest with the 10p tax fiasco. Sent our troops to war without the right equipment.

Failed to control immigration, putting massive pressure on our schools and hospitals. Left one in five young people unable to find a job. Destroyed our pensions system. Allowed thousands of criminals out early.

And let’s not forget the Prime Minister himself, who “unleashed the forces of hell” on his Chancellor in the middle of the longest and deepest recession since the war.

We’ve had our second look, Prime Minister — and you don’t deserve a second chance.

But what about the Conservatives? Gordon Brown also asked you to take a long, hard look at us. That’s fine by me. The more News of the World readers look at the vision we are offering, the more you’ll understand the scale of the change we will bring to get our country back on its feet.

It’s a change based on strong values — values we have always held: Responsibility and aspiration. And we know how we can bring those values alive.

Our approach is simple. A new Conservative government will send out the clearest signal to the whole country: If you do the right thing we’ll get behind you. We urgently need that approach with our economy. We will cut red tape, simplify Labour’s nightmare tax system, create 200,000 new apprenticeships and abolish employment taxes on the first ten jobs created by new businesses in the first two years of a new Conservative government.

It’s this approach that will mend our broken society too. We’ll reform welfare to help more people into work and change the law so that if you’re convicted of carrying a knife you can expect to go to jail.

We also need to bring this approach to the way we do politics in this country, so we will hand vast swathes of power back to people. It’s your street, it’s your neighbourhood, it’s your police force, it’s your school — so we’re going to let you take control of it.

Responsibility and aspiration. Two simple values that will have a profound effect on our country.

When this country is hit by crises we don’t roll over and die — we stand up and fight. I know that fight is within the people of Britain today.

All they want and need is a government that backs them when they do the right thing.

So that’s the choice at this election: five more years of Gordon Brown, or change with the Conservatives.